Jack Fingleton

Greg Growden

"Jack Fingleton was a formidable and courageous Australian opener during the Bodyline series, but he was much more than that. After his retirement he became a broadcaster with the BBC (much admired by Michael Parkinson) and cricket correspondent for the Sunday Times and London Observer. He then transformed himself into a political journalist of note (at one time he was press secretary to Billy Hughes). He was very well connected; his wife was the daughter of the great left-wing feminist, Jessie Street (and a sister of Sir Laurence Street). He had extensive personal correspondence with Menzies, Curtin, Chifley, McMahon and even Whitlam. Greg Growden has had unfettered access to all his correspondence and other archival material, which sheds extraordinary new lights on Australian sporting and political history. He was an implacable critic of Sir Donald Bradman, with whom he...